A Democratic Socialist Blog

Ferguson

The ugly face of racism looms with us again. The effects of a disintegrating economic and social culture that is now america. But it is not only about racism. We hear there are two America’s. One black, one white. There are two America’s. One with money and one with out. When I was a kid I knew of police violence of white kids. One person was dragged out of a festival and beaten by a few offices. One was cuffed to a fence and beaten in the knees with a Night Stick.

The new left keeps rocking the race hobby-horse and it is not completely wrong. Most cities with a majority of blacks are poor places.

For the survey, a large city is defined as a city with a population of 250,000 or more. Percentage of residents living below the U.S. government established poverty income level is listed, based on 2012 US Census estimates.

Detroit, Michigan 42.3%

>Cleveland, Ohio> 36.1%

Cincinnati, Ohio 34.1%

Miami, Florida 31.7%

Fresno, California 31.5%

Buffalo, New York 30.9%

Newark, New Jersey 30.4%

Toledo, Ohio 30.1%

Milwaukee, Wisconsin 29.9%

St. Louis, Missouri 29.2%

Camden New Jersey N/A

Most Cities where integrated with blacks in the 1960’s during the Great society programs. Whites where left in rural poverty with no representation what so ever.

According to Census figures in 2013, 18.9 million whites are poor. That’s 8 million more poor white people than poor black people, and more than 5 million more than those who identify as Latino. A majority of those benefiting from programs like food stamps and Medicaid are white, too.

But somehow our picture of poverty is different, and the media tends to tell us a different story. A recent New York Times story, Cut in Food Stamps Forces Hard Choices on Poor,” included only pictures of African Americans and Latinos from the Bronx, N.Y.,

This is not a defense of whites, because, The Times and others like them are likely responding to the reality that blacks and Latinos are disproportionately poor.

Yet, inadvertently, the traditional media’s one-sided image of poverty has contributed to the misconception that most poor people are black and that most black people are poor—although more than 70 percent are not.

This stereotype, like most stereotypes, harms black people in myriad ways, especially because the political right has linked poverty with moral failure as a trope to undermine public support for government programs—remember Ronald Reagan’s welfare queen? These tactics didn’t end in the 1980s. Last week, for example, Fox News’ Brad Blakeman said the government was “like a drug dealer” peddling “dependency” to food-stamp recipients.

Social scientists and others have long made the observation that the media over-emphasizes people of color in coverage of poverty and government benefits. But if the message hasn’t yet reached even the New York Times, it clearly needs to be said again.

Ferguson is an important moment because this shows that the Police react to blacks in a negative way, For Years, people like Abnor Luima, and the Stop and Frisk laws have targeted blacks. For 40 years with the War on Defeated by Reagan, and the initiation of a Wall Street/Military Government social consciousness has declined.

There sees to be a return to a war on blacks, voter IDs, Police Harassment, Attack on Education.

We need now between blacks and white need to get together in a Culture of Solidarity, vote for political parties that are progressive so we can have meaningful jobs, Universal Income, 100% Employment bills supported by Bernie Sanders and John Conyers. Educate against racism and learn multiculturalism in schools. Education. The more educated a person is the more aware they are of others, the more aware they are of others the more they see themselves and the more respect they have for others.

The problem is that racists have limited education or the subsequent experience increasing their awareness of other cultures.

In the end the problem I have found is not race, but culture. It’s not different races people have a problem with, it’s different cultures and their inability to mix well. We must have reconciliation and friendship with out Anti White bitterness. Succumbing to Right Wing fear and elite prejudices have gone too far As long as fear of people who are different, then this will always manifest itself into racism. We are all prejudiced in either small ways or large, but most of us do not let this prejudice fester into hatred and then into racism. Also, turning on whites is wrong because whites suffer also. The shooting of Michael Brown has Ferguson up in arms and protesting, lets hope a new civil rights and national change emerges from this giving birth to a new progressive era. There are too many instances and now is the time t fight the Right!